To customize the appearance of alerts, modify the css by using the Format element.

Resource variables listed within the template definition file, such as $Resources:Alerts_anything_filter_shortname, can be found in core.resx (in the local_drive\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\14\Resources folder)

If you are modifying any element other than the Format element, both the email and the SMS templates should be modified, in parallel – the 2 templates should be in sync except for the Format element.

(3) Load the custom templates by using the command: stsadm -o updatealerttemplates. I haven’t found a direct equivalent Powershell command.

If both, the email and the SMS template are updated, the UpdateAlertTemplates command needs to be run twice, once for each of the two files.

The meaning of this CAML piece is following: – "RawValue#" – I couldn’t find any decent documentation about this value. But my experiment has shown that "RawValue" is the FieldCollection of the SPItem – "Task". – CAML gets the ContentTypeId of the task, check if the content type id has a substring "0x010801" Why "0x010801"? – There are predefined content types in SharePoint, all custom content types are inherited from the basic one. The all basic content types are in the file {root folder\hive}\TEMPLATE\FEATURES\ctypes.xml.

1. Create a copy of alerttemplate.xml and change the CAML query there – replace <GetVar Name="RawValue#EmailBody"/> with what you want to see in the email, and run the stsadm command: stsadm -o updatealerttemplates -url {sitecollection url} -f {custom alerttemplate} –lcid 1033http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd278299%28v=office.12%29.aspxConsideration:The alert template is applied on the whole site collection. That means that you will change the email notification body for the whole site collection.